EDITORIAL: Around the state

The Times Union of Albany on financial problems facing New York and its local governments:

Here it comes, New York, another warning about how much money we don't have. Another detailed analysis, this time from state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, of the bills that need to be paid, and the fact that we don't have the dollars to pay them.

Advertisement

But this time the gap between what state and local governments can afford and what they must address is far more serious than the dilemma we often hear about, of solving our fiscal problems now or leaving them, altogether more severe, for the years or even generations to come.

Now we're talking about maintaining clean drinking water, treating sewage, and keeping roads and bridges from crumbling. New York needs to find a much better way to bear the cost of its fixing its crumbling infrastructure, DiNapoli says, or face stark consequences.

If a state comptroller's report can ever be compelling, this is it.

So, what should New York do?

"We need to enact real and meaningful reform of how we prioritize and fund public infrastructure projects," DiNapoli says. "It won't be easy, but now, more than ever, we must do this right."

So here's the choice, New York. Heed the warning now, or hear it yet again under likely more dire circumstances.

The Staten Island Advance on the National Rifle Association and the gun industry:

The National Rifle Association claims putting guns in the hands of more people is the way to deal with mass shootings in America. It says only good guys with guns can stop bad guys with guns.

Such was the shameful response of the NRA, one of the nation's most powerful political lobbying groups, to the slaughter of 20 first graders and six adults in Newtown, Conn.

Most Americans are saying enough is enough. But not the NRA.

There is a good reason for the group to cling to its reckless and hardcore stance in favor of weaponry. Beyond the 4 million members it represents -- hunters, sports shooters and collectors -- the National Rifle Association guards the interests of firearms merchants.

The quarter-billion-dollar-a-year lobby is a lock, stock and barrel partner of the $12 billion-a-year gun industry. Plain and simple, gun manufacturers pay the NRA to watch their back, and the NRA does it obediently.

NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre said last week that guns are only tools. Yes, and assault weapons are tools designed to kill as many people as possible in a short period of time. That is their only use.

According to surveys, most rank-and-file members of the NRA (like a majority of Americans) would be willing to support common-sense restrictions on guns.

But the leaders of the National Rifle Association will never go along with that. They know their own fate is tied to the profits of gun merchants. As long as the firearms industry thrives, so will they.

The New York Post on the death of Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf:

It was perhaps inevitable that the first-ever war broadcast live on TV would produce an outsize media hero like its commander, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf.

But the four-star general, who died last at 78, was no creation of the media -- though he was a natural in front of the cameras.

He was, instead, a battle-hardened, highly decorated combat veteran and a brilliant tactician who resisted the impulse of too many other generals to play politician.